Yahagi Returns With Sights Set on a Desert Double-Double

[Wandering Eyes]

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — It's what sport is all about, isn't it? Choosing your team and rooting for them, through good games and bad times. 

The fleeting nature of the careers of some racehorses can make it harder to be a fan, but not if you pick Team Yahagi. For a start, there is a good chance that Yoshito Yahagi will turn up at a major meeting almost anywhere in the world with at least one horse. In Riyadh, a city which has become a happy hunting ground for the Japanese trainer in recent years, he has a team of three, and two of them are returning heroes from last year's Saudi Cup meeting.

If ever there was a horse to get behind it is Forever Young. He has just turned five but it feels as though he has been around for ages. Let's hope that there's plenty of mileage left in those legs as valuable as Cyd Charisse's once were. He is grown up enough for us to call him a stallion now and he has already collected plenty of airmiles in travelling from Japan to Saudi Arabia, Dubai, America, home again, and then back to the USA – and that was just his three-year-old season. Last year, it was almost a case of rinse and repeat, bar the fact that he made just the one hugely memorable trip to the States in 2025 for the Breeders' Cup Classic.

Forever Young could hardly have a more appropriate sire than Real Steel, for that appears to be what he is made of and he is gathering an expanding army of followers with every step he takes on a racecourse. Even Bob Baffert, who fields two rivals in the Saudi Cup, is a fan. “He's unbelievable, I have so much respect for that horse,” he said on Thursday morning. 

This Saturday, in defending his Saudi Cup crown, Forever Young will aim to add a further $10 million to his earnings of $21.2 million already accrued from 13 starts and 10 wins. And, for those suggesting that he may not be quite fit enough, having not raced since November 1, we're sorry to disappoint you but he looks, well, a million dollars, maybe more. 

A question was posed in Thursday morning's press conference as to whether the Japan Racing Association uses data scientists to give their licensed trainers an edge in honing runners for the racecourse. It was batted away by the jovial Yahagi, who, despite being one of the world's most successful trainers, doesn't appear to take himself too seriously. After winning the Breeders' Cup Classic he was filmed singing and dancing in a Mexican restaurant where he had gone to watch his team, the LA Dodgers, complete a memorable sporting double – for Yahagi at least – by winning the World Series. Data is useful, of course, but no weights or measures or stride-pattern programmes can replace the eyes and the intuition of a horseman. 

And when it comes to certain horses, attitude almost transcends talent. In Forever Young, there is a heady blend of both those attributes. Plenty of horses would never have put up another bold show after the kind of scrimmaging he was subjected to in the 2024 Kentucky Derby. That was the race that made the boy a man, and instead of raising a metaphorical white flag at that tender stage of his career, Forever Young appeared to gain strength from that narrow loss and double down on his will to win.

However good Yahagi is at keeping his horses sweet, that kind of mettle cannot be taught. They either have it or they don't, and the fact that this horse is plainly as sound of limb as he is of mind only helps him in his quest. Travel doesn't faze him, neither does hard training. To watch Forever Young in the morning is a joy to behold, especially because such routinely unflappable behaviour is only exhibited by a horse with nothing to fear in being asked to draw deep once more on his athletic reserves.

 

Forever Young and Shin Emperor paddock schooling on Thursday | Emma Berry

 

“It's an honour to be back here for myself, and also Forever Young loves this place, so I am very pleased to be here,” said Yahagi, who has brought the horse here twice to win the Saudi Derby and Saudi Cup, having also trained Panthalassa to win the Cup in 2023. He is the only trainer to have won the world's most valuable race twice, and he has also claimed wins in the Neom Turf Cup and 1351 Turf Sprint. No wonder he likes returning. 

Having assured another questioner that Forever Young, who heads next to the Dubai World Cup, is “over 90 per cent fit”, Yahagi added, “There is a bit of a gap between the Breeders' Cup and here, and back in Japan I thought he was gaining a little bit of weight, but when I saw him this morning, I thought he looked very fit and ready for the race.”

Reflecting on last year's unforgettable victory over 12-time Group 1 winner Romantic Warrior (Acclamation), the trainer said, “Honestly speaking, I would like to compete with him again. It was like something from a movie script. I wanted to give Forever Young an Academy Award.”

If he romps through another season like he has his last two, then there is certainly a film to be made of Forever Young's career, even if there may be no Hollywood ending. Having competed in the last two Breeders' Cups in California, he appears unlikely to be asked to make the trip to Keeneland later this year. 

“The situation is going to be different from what we had in Del Mar, which is the on the west coast of the United States and closer to Japan,” Yahagi explained. “For Mr Fujita, the horse's owner, it is a long trip, so we haven't decided yet.”

He added of achieving the accolade of becoming the first Japanese trainer to win the Breeders' Cup Classic, “For me, it's something I can be proud of in Japan. For horseracing in Japan, the Breeders' Cup Classic was a big obstacle. Everyone was reluctant to participate in it but I'm glad that it has been overcome, and I'm glad that there will be more challengers in the future.”

Yahagi's regular jockey Ryusei Sakai sat alongside him in the morning press conference and appears to be drinking from the same well of confidence as his boss. He proclaimed that he will ride five winners on Saturday. He only has five mounts. Along with Forever Young, Sakai will be aboard Best Green (Smart Falcon) in the Saudi Derby, American Stage (Into Mishief) in the Riyadh Dirt Sprint, Fortune Time (Greater London) in the 1351 Turf Sprint and returning champion Shin Emperor (Siyouni) in the Neom Turf Cup. He'll sit out the Red Sea Turf Handicap and let someone else have a chance. 

Shin Emperor, the French-bred Arqana August-topping brother to Arc and Prix du Jockey Club hero Sottsass, has been another globetrotter for Yahagi, who was bullish in his assessment of the five-year-old pulling off a repeat performance in the newly upgraded G1 Howden Neom Turf Cup. 

“Shin Emperor has a very big chance because this race track – 2,100 metres on a left-hand course – is perfect for him, so he has a great chance,” he said. 

A double-double in the two Group 1 contests of the day on dirt and turf? If anyone can pull it off it's the man in the hat: the all-singing and dancing Yoshito Yahagi.

 

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